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US stock future indexes are fractionally higher as are crude prices. Stocks seems to be getting a further lift from the ongoing first-quarter corporate earnings season. Oil prices have regained some ground as a result of an oil worker strike in Kuwait that has reduced output, however Russia is now saying they will increase their output. Housing starts came in lower this morning missing analysts higher estimates.

LONDON (Reuters) - Global stocks reached their highest levels since early December on Tuesday as oil prices rose, driven by a strike in Kuwait, and signs of economic stabilization in China improved demand for risky assets.

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil rose around two percent on Tuesday as a strike by oil workers in Kuwait nearly halved crude production from the OPEC member, overshadowing bearish sentiment following Sunday's failure by producers to agree to freeze output levels.

LONDON (Reuters) - Anheuser-Busch InBev , the brewer which is in the process of acquiring rival SABMiller , said it accepted an offer from Japan's Asahi Group for Peroni and a group of other SAB beer brands.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - As Valeant Pharmaceuticals considers a multibillion-dollar auction to pare down $30 billion in debt, its challenge will be choosing which assets to sell without compromising any of its key businesses, analysts and investment bankers said.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Discount retailer Target Corp has started raising employee wages to a minimum of $10 an hour, its second hike in a year, pressured by a competitive job market and labor groups calling for higher wages at retail chains, sources said.

BRUSSELS/BEIJING (Reuters) - Under pressure to curb steel output and relieve a global glut, China said on Tuesday its production actually hit a record high last month as rising prices, and profits, encouraged mills that had been shut or suspended to resume production.

(Reuters) - Streaming video service Netflix Inc forecast U.S. and international subscriptions would grow at a slower pace than Wall Street expected this quarter, sending its shares tumbling 8 percent in after-hours trading on Monday.

The battle boils down to what controls the market: central banks or fundamentals.

The tug of war between Bull and Bear has rarely been so clearly matched--and the stakes have rarely been so high.

Bulls are confident that central banks have their back in 2016. After all, whatever it takes has successfully pushed equities higher for seven years. Why not an eighth?

Many Bulls also believe the global downturn is over and higher growth is just ahead.

Bears see equities in a multi-year topping process that is remarkably similar to the tops in 2000 and 2008. Bears see sagging profits and stagnant sales as evidence that fundamentals no longer support historically high valuations.

Bulls and Bears can tout data, historical patterns and charts to support their case. Two simple charts cut to the chase: a simple chart of the SPX (S & P 500) and a chart of the real SPX (adjusted to present-day dollars, i.e. inflation) and margin debt, which is the debt punters have borrowed against their stock portfolios (courtesy of chartist Doug Short: NYSE Margin Debt Falls Again: More Confirmation of a Major Market Turning Point Last Year?

Though Bulls try to make the case that the global economy is about to enter a new growth cycle and equities are under-valued, this is simply code for central banks cannot afford to let equities decline. Given high levels of debt, decli ...

"It's a combination of silver getting a bit of attention over the past week with the big move in the gold/silver ratio and quite a few market participants looking at silver in and its relative performance to gold and thinking it might be time for a bit of catch up."

There was some hope that after a better than expected result from JPM and, to a lesser extent MS and WFC, that Goldman would surprise to the upside. That did not happen even though the company moments ago reported EPS of $2.68 beating expectations of $2.48, which nonetheless was a 55% plunge in earnings from a year ago.

But the real story was in the company's revenue which printing at $6.4 billion was not only a huge miss to expectations of $6.7 billion, but a massive slide of 40% from Q1 2015 driven by top-line weakness across the board. This was the worst revenue quarter for Goldman since Q4 2011.

As the chart below shows, revenues declined in virtually all groups, with the all important FICC plunging 47% to $1.663 billion, Investment Banking down 23% to $1.46 billion, Equity trading down 23% to $1.78 billion. Goldman's explanation:

Net revenues in Fixed Income, Currency and Commodities Client Execution were $1.66 billion for the first quarter of 2016, 47% lower compared with a strong first quarter of 2015. During the first quarter of 2016, Fixed Income, Currency and Commodities Client Execution operated in a challenging environment characterized by economic uncertainty and difficult market-making conditions, which resulted in significantly lower net revenues across all major businesses compared with the first quarter of 2015.

Net revenues in Equities were $1.78 billion for the first quarter of 2016, 23% lower than the first quarter of 2015, due to significantly lower net revenues in equities client execution c ...

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